Well, we now have official word about the new album and more about this film to go with it yesterday so I’ve just got to write another post now. To start with here’s the flyer below:
Skeleton Tree is quite a title for this new album, my imagination fires in all directions with just those couple of words. We really get no more info about the album really but more about film that goes with the album or/and is the only promo to go before it’s release which is just the night before. With everyone doing different things helping the releases of new music Cave and his band is doing it in cinemas around the world, I got my tickets too! This feature film called is One More Time With Feeling, directed by Andrew Dominik and to quote the press release:
delved into the tragic backdrop of the writing and recording of the album. Interwoven throughout the Bad Seeds’ filmed performance of the new album are interviews and footage shot by Dominik, accompanied by Cave’s intermittent narration and improvised rumination. Filmed in black-and-white and colour, in both 3D and 2D, the result is stark, fragile and raw.
So looks like we are all diving into his grief and lose of his son which was not even 12 months ago, it was only 14th of July last year. But it does say work for this album started in late 2014 at Retreat Studios in Brighton which was before that event. Plus as a side note here I’ll like to point out it’s first recording of band of where Cave now lives and has been living along time since moving out of London and getting married, before Skeleton Tree only the soundtrack to the film Far From Men was recorded so close to home and it was at the same recording studio so could you say they started working on this new album while/after recording that soundtrack? Then autumn 2015 which is pretty much around September in the Northern Hemisphere worked continued down at La Frette Studios La Frette-sur-Seine in the south of France which is the same studio as they recorded the last album, Push The Sky Away. Then was the whole thing was mixed at AIR Studios in London in earlier this year, one of his fave studios over the last few years which he done alot of recording at for all of his different projects. This new album Skeleton Tree has been in the works only a year after the release of that last Bad Seeds album, Push The Sky Away so it’s been one of longest time frames, over the last three years really. With the film 20, 000 Days On Earth and the book The Sick Bag Song and then look at all the tours for the last album plus then the “Solo” tour also it’s one longest times he’s also spend on the road in his whole career but it was broken up by gaps in between to do these other things too.
A few other bit and pieces I’ve dig-up is that it’s begin reported that Skeleton Tree only contains 8 tracks but I can’t find any tracklisting yet, if I was a betting man I think we will not find the names out until the night before in that film. Then again a bit about it was leak out a week before the official announcement or are we just going to get eight untitled songs? It’s also been self-producer which I’ll add now, that’s first time ever The Bad Seeds haven’t had producer behind the desks. Nick Launay worked on all The Bad Seeds albums plus Grinderman ones too since 2003 so it’s been a long time working with him really but it’s a bit overtime to take the producer out of the whole deal. The last album was the first one away from the long time label Mute Records which did pretty much released all his album since the early 80’s. No word on the line-up of the band for this new album too, Cave is sitting alone at his grand piano in promo images so far.
The album art cover is just totally black and you could you call it his black album? The band name and album title type out in old blueish computer font, after the last album cover being all light, having an old type writer font with Cave himself in his suit opening the window at his Brighton home on his totally naked wife standing on her tip-toes on the cover. So after that bright and light, we get the very bleak and dark this time, it’s setting the tone from the album and speaks volumes of want we should be preparing for. I’m guess now it might just be a totally stripped back version of Bad Seeds this time, maybe even just Warren Ellis, Marty P. Casey and Thomas Wydler or something like that or maybe the line-up on the so-called “Solo” tour but off-course that’s all just a guess but everything so far does seems very minimalism.
I don’t know what else to say other that I can’t wait but I think I’ve made that pretty clear, should be one of the albums and films of this year!
a1000mistakes 
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